Victim’s family reflects on ‘soul-consuming’ Durst case

New York real estate heir Robert Durst has been sentenced to life in prison without a chance of parole for the murder of his best friend in 2000.

Durst, 78, was convicted in Los Angeles Superior Court last month of first-degree murder for shooting Susan Berman pointblank in the back of the head at her home in December 2000.

The killing had been a mystery that haunted family and friends for 15 years before Durst was arrested in 2015 following his unwise decision to participate in a documentary that unearthed new evidence and caught him in a stunning confession.

Berman’s death left a permanent hole in the lives of family members who remember her for her adventurousness, creativity and deep love and loyalty.

“It has been a daily, soulconsuming and crushing experience,” said Sareb Kaufman, who considered Berman his mother after his father dated her. “I’ve lost everything many times over because of him.”

Durst, who has numerous medical issues and sat in a wheelchair wearing brown jail scrubs, said nothing during his Thursday sentencing. His eyes were wide open, and he had a catatonic stare when he entered the courtroom and barely looked over at Kaufman and three of Berman’s cousins when they spoke.

Durst silenced Berman to prevent her from incriminating him in the reopened investigation of his wife’s 1982 disappearance in New York, prosecutors said.

Berman provided a phony alibi for Durst when Kathie Durst vanished, prosecutors said.

Durst testified he didn’t kill either woman, but he said on cross-examination that he would lie if he had.

Prosecutors also presented evidence that he intentionally killed a neighbour in Galveston, Texas, in 2001, though he had been acquitted of murder in that case after testifying that he shot the man in self-defence and then panicked and chopped up the corpse and tossed it out to sea.

Defence lawyer Dick DeGuerin said Durst will appeal, and he refrained from making other remarks.

Judge Mark Windham denied a motion for a new trial, rejecting arguments there was insufficient evidence or that he ruled incorrectly on 15 issues.

“You said the court erred so many times it made me feel self-conscious,” Windham said jokingly. Windham said there was overwhelming evidence and prosecutors proved guilt beyond a reasonable doubt at least five ways, including devastating revelations during Durst’s crossexamination and an admission he made in the climax of the sixpart documentary, The Jinx: The Life and Crimes of Robert Durst.

After being caught in a lie about a note he penned directing police to Berman’s lifeless body, Durst went into a bathroom and muttered to himself on a live microphone: “You’re caught.” He later said: “Killed them all, of course.”

Filmmakers confronted him with a note police received that had Berman’s address and only the word “cadaver.” It was addressed in block letters and misspelled Beverly Hills as “Beverley.”

Durst said only the killer could have written it, and it wasn’t him. He was then shown a letter he once wrote Berman in the same handwriting and Beverly misspelled the same way.

Durst testified that he regretted participating in the documentary.